Rajasthan’s Kota district administration has imposed Section 144 from Tuesday to April 21 to “maintain law and order” in view of the screening of The Kashmir Files during the upcoming festivals.
Section 144 of the Code of Criminal Procedure bans the assembly of four or more people in public places.
“Kota district is highly vulnerable from a communal point of view,” the order said. “Dharnas, demonstrations, meetings, and processions due to the film, the death of youth while bathing in the Chambal river during the upcoming festivals may affect the situation of public order.”
Some of the upcoming festivals during this period include Cheti Chand, Mahavir Jayanti, and Baisakhi.
The order further stated that crowds are also banned from gathering to watch the film together.
The Kashmir Files is a Hindi drama film based on the exodus of the Kashmiri Pandit community from the Kashmir valley in the 1990s. The film features actors Anupam Kher, Mithun Chakraborty, Darshan Kumaar, Pallavi Joshi, Prakash Belawadi, Puneet Issar, and Atul Srivastava, among others.
Responding to the announcement of Section 144, director of the film, Vivek Agnihotri, tweeted questioning Union Minister for Information and Broadcasting Anurag Thakur about the justice in the film being sabotaged by a state.
He further tagged Rajasthan Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot and said that the “only strength of terrorists is that they create fear and we get afraid.”
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Gehlot had earlier taken to Twitter, last week, and said that the atmosphere being created in the country because of the film The Kashmir Files, would increase the divide between different religions. He further tweeted in Hindi, “The debate on this film in the media and on social media spoils the atmosphere of brotherhood and harmony. The exodus of Pandits from Kashmir at that time caused pain to all countrymen, irrespective of their religion.”
After Agnihotri’s tweet, the district administration of Kota took to social media and clarified that there is no ban on the screening or viewing of the film.